When I had my second baby, I hadn't yet worked for 2 year at the company where I was and that meant I could not be given the 3 months allowed maternity leave. However I had a wonderful boss and he offered to give me 2 months of paid leave. This left little time for me to spend with my new born or get a nanny and much less to train her to take care of the baby the way I wanted it done.
I asked one of my colleagues at the office if he knew anyone in his neighbourhood who could help. I had a selection of nannies to interview based on work experience, how they talked and yes I was prejudiced to how they dressed and what they generally looked liked. Then came through Priscilla. She had just completed her Grade 12 about 8 months before, she spoke English and Nyanja, lived in the neighbouring compound and had taken care of her sisters children. She seemed stable, young and teachable. By this time I only had a month to get back to work. So Priscilla started work the next day.
She started well, cleaning and sterilizing feeding bottles as required, changing diapers and cleaning all my pans and scraping off the non-stick coating on them with a steel mesh wool scrubber. These have now been discarded due to the amount of dangerous rust they collected after every clean.
So off I went to work and when I got home, I found the baby clean and sleeping and Priscilla watching the local television channels. 4 weeks later Priscilla had switched to African magic and that's all I found her watching. I asked her after 3 months to be sleeping over as I needed to attend some evening classes. She would cook diner with as much cooking oil as she could pour. Lessons were learned here and we moved on.
About 5 months after she begun spending nights over, her viewing preference changed dramatically. She was now into detective series and comedies, music videos (Trace and MTV) and the occasional Disney Junior channel for my son. I came home one night to be told she had set a reminder for me for a new detective series which she thought might be really good.
A year after being hired she decided she wanted to go back to school and get a diploma in Pre-school teaching. I encouraged her, wondering what would happen to my son who'd just turned a year. So she went on to get some enrollment forms at a school half an hour from the house and decided she'd start 4 months later. A week before her school was to start, she brought Rebecca who she said was her cousin or a relation of that sort. Rebecca spoke very little English but had 2 children of her own. Priscilla went on to further tell me that Rebecca would work for half a day, from Monday to Friday during which time Priscilla would be in school. To my amazement Priscilla said she would also sort out Rebecca's wages from whatever I gave her (this was before the revision of minimum wage). And there I had it, an employee employing in my own house! And of course it only took 6 months for Rebecca to also come up with her own ideas about going to school, which again I encouraged. Sadly, Rebecca is moving to a different town with her family and I now await Priscilla's next move in her evolution process.
I asked one of my colleagues at the office if he knew anyone in his neighbourhood who could help. I had a selection of nannies to interview based on work experience, how they talked and yes I was prejudiced to how they dressed and what they generally looked liked. Then came through Priscilla. She had just completed her Grade 12 about 8 months before, she spoke English and Nyanja, lived in the neighbouring compound and had taken care of her sisters children. She seemed stable, young and teachable. By this time I only had a month to get back to work. So Priscilla started work the next day.
She started well, cleaning and sterilizing feeding bottles as required, changing diapers and cleaning all my pans and scraping off the non-stick coating on them with a steel mesh wool scrubber. These have now been discarded due to the amount of dangerous rust they collected after every clean.
So off I went to work and when I got home, I found the baby clean and sleeping and Priscilla watching the local television channels. 4 weeks later Priscilla had switched to African magic and that's all I found her watching. I asked her after 3 months to be sleeping over as I needed to attend some evening classes. She would cook diner with as much cooking oil as she could pour. Lessons were learned here and we moved on.
About 5 months after she begun spending nights over, her viewing preference changed dramatically. She was now into detective series and comedies, music videos (Trace and MTV) and the occasional Disney Junior channel for my son. I came home one night to be told she had set a reminder for me for a new detective series which she thought might be really good.
A year after being hired she decided she wanted to go back to school and get a diploma in Pre-school teaching. I encouraged her, wondering what would happen to my son who'd just turned a year. So she went on to get some enrollment forms at a school half an hour from the house and decided she'd start 4 months later. A week before her school was to start, she brought Rebecca who she said was her cousin or a relation of that sort. Rebecca spoke very little English but had 2 children of her own. Priscilla went on to further tell me that Rebecca would work for half a day, from Monday to Friday during which time Priscilla would be in school. To my amazement Priscilla said she would also sort out Rebecca's wages from whatever I gave her (this was before the revision of minimum wage). And there I had it, an employee employing in my own house! And of course it only took 6 months for Rebecca to also come up with her own ideas about going to school, which again I encouraged. Sadly, Rebecca is moving to a different town with her family and I now await Priscilla's next move in her evolution process.
